I don’t really know how to review something like this as it was so personal and raw. I still can’t believe some of the stuff I was reading about are actually happening right now in this world. This is a diary that Plestia kept following 7 October and her journey into becoming a press journalist during the ongoing Palestinian genocide. It is a tough but necessary glimpse into how such a normal person’s life can be turned completely upside down and the scale of the destruction that is being witnessed by millions of people. I loved her poetry and some of her musings on life were really special, despite the pain she is going through. Really recommend reading this and we will not rest until Palestine is free.

I’ve been asking myself for days how it is possible to review and rate this book. I’ve seen this question also plague the mind and thoughts of other readers and reviewers. It’s a small thing in the grand scheme of things, and yet it feels vital. It feels vital at least, to bear witness, and to share with others this account by Plestia Alaqad, The Eyes of Gaza. With all the horrors, heartbreak and death that are happening in Palestine, is it not the least we can do to pay attention and share the reality that so many Palestinians face that the world, at large, continues to ignore or deem acceptable?

Plestia’s diary accounts are terrifying in so many ways. Not just because of what is happening in Gaza, but Plestia’s recollection that this is not the first time. What a world that we live in that in certain geographical locations, occupations and assaults are the daily standard. That you can mark the passage of time by how long it’s been since the last attack.

This book, on account of it being Alaqad’s journal, is so raw and honest and so incredibly human. Alaqad writes fantastically. I really felt as if I got to know her through this.

This book really should be in everyone’s reading lists.
Always and forever, Free Palestine 🇵🇸

Thank you to Pan Macmillan | Macmillan for this e-arc

Impossible to review like any other book. Devastating to read the diary of a young woman going through the genocide of her people. The whole world can see it yet the leaders of the so called civilised world do nothing. There is nothing I can say.

I started this book not knowing much about the tragedies that are occurring in Palestine. The Eyes of Gaza is an incredibly important read for anyone wanting to understand the impact the war between Israel and Palestine is causing on the innocent residents of Gaza.

Through Alaqad’s diary extracts, she reveals the harsh realities she and others endured. While I don’t read much non-fiction, this book is written in a way that is easy to read while still remaining incredibly impactful.

It feels impossible to review or rate a book this personal and tragic. Alaqad takes the reader on an incredibly poignant journey during her time in Gaza during the Genocide, and what she witnesses. There were several times where I had to put the book down and take a deep breath before continuing. Everyone should read this. From the river to the sea 🕊️

I don’t think that I will read a more harrowing or reflective book this year. There were many sections that I first read and then had to re-read and highlight due to the power of their impact. It was informative, emotional and beyond necessary. Plestia’s honesty and vulnerability about her emotions and her experience both in Gaza and once she moves to Australia with her family is heartbreaking and real.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC.

I highly recommend this book to everyone to read. It was such an emotional and informative autobiography that everyone should read. This book is abounds the horrors going on in Palestine and the aftermath of leaving.

Thank you Plestia for sharing with us the atrocities going on in your homeland whilst sharing the humanity of the people.

Do I compare The Eyes of Gaza to The Diary of a Young Girl? Do I, don’t I… I suppose a comparison detracts from both works, but it is interesting to note that Plestia Alaqad does indeed write about Anne Frank in her diary, and wonders if her own writing might have a similar impact.

One major difference of course is that Plestia is a young woman, while Anne was a young girl - this shows in the maturity of Plestia’s writing, and both her knowledge of, and refusal, to be a “perfect victim”.

I enjoyed the tone of Alaqad’s writing - modern, conversational, with some dark humour too. The read is quick, and the subject matter is tough, but presented by her in such a scarily relatable way. Her writing on family, Gaza as a mother, Palestinians as an expansive family, and the trauma related to living through a genocide (and the many aggressions prior to that) is incisive.

It remains painful to read, knowing how much cruelty is taking place and how many people continue to deny that a genocide is taking place.

As a minor theme, Alaqad’s journey to journalism, and the way that she has used journalism to bring Gaza’s plight to the world, which in turn, has further strengthened her journalistic calibre, is very good material for anybody wondering about their career.

"It would seem that the eyes and the ears of the world aren't interested in Palestinian life, only in Palestinian death"

book: the eyes of gaza
author: plestia alaqad

i don’t know where to start with this other than to say that it should be required reading. my heart breaks for the people of gaza every day and reading this made me even more angry and heartbroken at the world, but completely in awe of the people of palestine. just knowing what plestia alaqad survived makes the words that she’s written so powerful. every single word on every single page made such a huge impact… reading about children making bracelets with people’s names on so that they could be identified absolutely broke me.

please read this as soon as possible… it is so important.

free palestine 🇵🇸

If you have been witnessing the genocide on Gaza since October 7, you are surely familiar with Plestia Alaqad's account and the excerpts from her diary that she's been sharing. The Eyes of Gaza collects what she wrote in during the first 45 days of the genocide, what she wrote after she evacuated and on the announcement of a potential ceasefire (which has since been violated).

As I write this, we are on day 570 of the genocide. It is heartbreaking to have read this book, seeing how Plestia, her family and her neighbors initially thought this would be an "Aggression" like many others they have seen during the years.

Throughout the book, Plestia talks about how living and surviving so many attacks affects the Palestinian people, especially those living in Gaza. How they have developed certain "rituals" to apply as soon they hear the sound of bombs. How Israel steals people's identities by erasing their homes, their families, the key buildings and people of their lives, their history but also their own bodies. How activities that are meant to be fun for kids, like making bracelets or drawing, become a way to cope and survive the violence. How children are robbed from experiencing childhood. How even the possibility to evacuate is also part of the mechanism of displacement.

Going into this, I didn't know Plestia was merely a year older than me and reading her words often felt like reading a friend's writing. I feel huge admiration for her courage in publishing this book because it's surely not easy to get something as intimate and vulnerable as a diary out there, especially one talking about something that she still is going through. I think if you have people around you who are young, whom you want to start talking about Palestine with, this would be an excellent pick as the writing is accessible and yet, nothing is toned down to make the reader feel comfortable.

There really isn't much I could say about the topic of the book that isn't already talked about in it so please do pick it up, learn, share what you learn with those around you and keep advocating for a Free Palestine.

Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for the e-ARC.

Should be mandatory reading. The tone was a little too Gen Z for me and I felt the writer lost her message (of vital importance) towards the end.

Ultimately think it is a starter pack for everything you should know about the genocide. Raw and emotional.

This was absolutely fantastic, I really enjoyed this. I know this might be a strange way to describe a book with such a tough subject matter, but the way this was written was very well done. It's very accessible to cater to multiple audiences and ages, with a sprinkling of humour and real life thrown in there. The depictions and descriptions of the genocide really helped put you in Alaqad's shoes which made reading it all the more harder.

I'm glad it was a short book, as I think this would have been an even more difficult read if it was longer, but I think the size was the perfect length.

I have been recommending this to everyone and it will definitely be stuck in my mind for a long time to come.

Not an easy book to review. The writing felt very Gen Z, such isn't what I normally like to read, but it was a compelling read about the awful injustice and genocide that the Palestinian people are enduring, and a first hand account of the tragedy of Gaza and its violent occupation by Israel. I'd recommend it.

"It would seem that the eyes and ears of the world aren’t interested in Palestinian life, only in Palestinian death."

"This isn't an Aggression anymore. It's a Genocide. There isn't another word that can describe the scale of violence I see in front of me."

"It's a calculated, deliberate, and ruthless ethnic cleansing, and nobody seems to care. Why do we live in a world where Genocide has been normalized?"

This book is heartbreaking but such an important read. Anyone who thinks that this is a "war" and both sides are as bad as each other should be reading this. It is a genocide and Plestia shows the devastation. At only 23 she is "4 Israeli aggressions old". She recorded the destruction and brutality of her people and country.

She shows the beauty and life of Gaza before the genocide. She also shows the humans, the ones who are being wiped out by ethnic cleansing. Palestinians are beautiful humans, and the love they show for each other and their country during such horrific times is incredible. People who have lost everything will share anything they have. Strangers are digging through rubble to help families find their loved ones. Children are making bracelets so that they can identify their loved ones bodies. Doctors are still trying to help the injured in the worst conditions whilst putting their lives at risk.

This book details the genocide. There is no defending bombing hospitals, churches, and shelters. Murdering Journalists and doctors is a war crime.
Plestia's diary entries are raw and full of emotion. She describes how getting out has resulted in so much pain and guilt at being safe whilst family and friends are trapped and likely to die.

"December me thought that making it out alive would be the best case scenario. Right now I can't see it. I'm safe and alive, but I don't think I know what being alive truly means."

Whilst this is a hard read it is a privelage to only witness this atrocity through pages/screens.

REVIEW
cw: bullying, genocide, war crimes, suicidal ideation

In early October 2023, Palestinian Plestia Alaqad was a recent graduate with dreams of becoming a successful journalist. By the end of November, her social media posts depicting daily life in Gaza, amid Israel's deadly invasion and bombardment, would profoundly move millions of people. She would be internationally known as the 'Eyes of Gaza'. Told in three distinct parts, the book is a mix of poetry and first-hand recollections from within Gaza, before the events of October 2023, during, and after the author and her family were able to cross the border into Egypt.


This was a deeply humbling read, especially as I always read in bed. A warm, safe bed, where I know I'm certain to wake up surrounded by my family, with access to everything I could possibly need to survive. I say humbling because what shone through repeatedly was the love, kindness, and generosity of the Palestinian people.
I wish I had even a single per cent of Plestia Alaqad's writing skills to adequately put into words how I feel about this book. Instead, I simply urge everyone, and I DO mean everyone, to read The Eyes of Gaza. I personally first learned about what was actually happening in Gaza while studying in Spain in the 90s. I was the same age then as the author was when she started writing this diary. I will always be eternally grateful to my Catalan journalism professor who, in the middle of a European economics course, went completely off-topic and redefined everything I'd ever seen or heard on British TV news about Palestine.
The diary entries follow Plestia's realisation that this particular 'aggression' is not like the others she's lived through.
I found myself screaming at the page multiple times, both at what was happening, and also knowing (in hindsight) what was still to come, especially reading the early diaries entries set in places, I, as a safe westerner have heard of only in devastating reports of horrendous humanitarian violations and war crimes. From her family home in Gaza City to Al-Shifa Hospital, to Khan Younis, and then across the Rafah Border Crossing, we follow her repeated displacement along with her family, friends (old and new), and colleagues. And, while Plestia tells of the bombs, the drones, the sinister warnings used to psychologically torture the Palestinians daily, what stood out most was their kindness, their wonderful sense of community, as well as their profound humanity and resilience. No one should have to live their lives in such fear and flux. The first-hand accounts were horrific, but the overwhelming sense of kindness and attempted normalcy, such as the search for Aloos’ plant, the ice cream, and little Waleed with his birthday sweets, were beautiful little beacons of hope. But I also found myself wondering what became of each and every person she met along the way, especially as so many were displaced to places that we've all seen in the news. In between all of the horrific realities of genocide, there was also Plestia's dry sense of humour. I loved the sibling teasing through the page as she spoke about her brother, Ahmed. But the survivor's guilt was palpable in the third part of the book. How does anyone ever recover from genocide? Especially when it seems the world doesn't care. I wish I had an answer. Instead, I urge everyone to read this first-hand account.
If you’re, in any way, somehow still on the fence* about the reality of what Israel has done in Gaza, you NEED to read this book.

Overall Rating:

*Thanks to the publisher for an ARC of this book. All opinions are my own. The Eyes of Gaza is published on 17th April in the UK*

*and let me be clear, the fence was bombed a long, LONG time ago (if it ever existed at all)

"This isn't an Aggression anymore. It's a Genocide. There isn't another word that can describe the scale of violence I see in front of me."
"It's a calculated, deliberate and ruthless ethnic cleansing, and nobody seems to care. Why do we live in a world where Genocide has been normalized?"

Plestia Alaqad has published her diaries for the world to read. Her first-hand account of the horrors she witnessed and experienced as a journalist in Gaza are gut-wrenching.

"Why is that Palestinians are so dehumanized that the world believes it's our God-given role to die? If what is happening in Gaza was happening in any other country, would the world remain as silent and calm?"

By reading this diary, I've not only gained an insight into Plestia, the journalist who I follow on Instagram but a Plestia before October 7th, 2023. She was a Journalism graduate from a university in Cyprus. She had a social life and she used to frequent the restaurants and cafes in Gaza that have now been destroyed. Her diary entries voice what once was and what it has now become.

We read about her guilt of fleeing Gaza and her trying to navigate her new normal. The Eyes of Gaza is truly a diary of resilience. May Plestia's voice remain loud and strong and may our hope never fade of Palestine becoming free.

"It would seem that the eyes and ears of the world aren’t interested in Palestinian life, only in Palestinian death."

The Eyes of Gaza is a heartbreaking and harrowing account of the genocide in Gaza told through Plestia Alaqad's diary entries as she experienced the events firsthand.

This book is a hard but necessary read. It had me in tears nearly throughout and my heart aching from sorrow, helplessness, and frustration.

Plestia was only 21 years old when the genocide started and she had to watch her people and country being killed. While trying to comprehend the death and destruction amidst the chaos of fear and uncertainty, she still decided to document events on social media for the world to see. She's simultaneously a young woman, journalist, daughter, sister, friend, Palestinian, and a victim of genocide though she expresses her frustrations with how Palestinians are often only seen as the latter; as victims or numbers rather than individual human beings who all have lives, hopes, and dreams. Using her own diary entries and recounting stories from and about the people she interacted with, it's impossible for any reader to think of the many deaths in Gaza merely as numbers.

Plestia's reporting on Palestine in late 2023 meant I already knew of her but reading this book allowed for a more insightful and nuanced understanding of her and what she's gone through. Reading her account of what she experienced, how in a few days she went from worrying about what to wear to being unable to sleep due to all the death she'd seen, how big a toll reporting on the genocide took on her mental and physical health on top of having to live it, and yet how she never stopped was such a testament to her bravery and resilience.

These qualities seem to be shared by the Palestinian people as a whole - their resilience, resistance, and refusal to give up or give in is as admirable as it is sad that it constantly has to be put to the test. The continuous stories of Palestinians coming together to support each other in any way possible, even when they've lost their homes or family members and are in fear of their own lives, speaks to the love and community they feel for their people and their country.

Throughout the book, Plestia's sorrow, fear, fatigue, and frustration with not only the genocide itself but also the international reaction or lack thereof is clear. It's hard to read this book without feeling helpless and sad and reckoning with your own privilege as well as the lack of adequate action by those with power in the international community.

The Eyes of Gaza is a visceral and raw book about a currently ongoing genocide. It's both an on-the-ground account and a plea for justice and for the world to wake up and act! It's a hard but necessary read that underscores the humanity of all Palestinians and the need for a free Palestine!

"For Palestinians, the war is never over—ceasefire is merely the space between tragedies. And in that space, we carry with us the unbearable weight of memories that cannot be undone."

//

"It’s a different type of pain, to see your homeland, once covered with olive and lemon trees, lush, fruitful pastures and the remnants of ancient, beautiful humanity, reduced to rubble, populated by camps and tents. I can’t always gather the strength to film what I see, because my eyes don’t want to believe that what they see is true. So instead, I just walk through the camp, between the tents, watching people’s eyes and trying to memorize their faces, so that somebody will have known them before the end."


Thank you to Pan Macmillan for the ARC

I have so much to say about this but in short- this book should be made mandatory reading in history classes in secondary schools as a primary source of what it is like to exist in a genocide when the world is silent. In the UK at least we are made to read first hand accounts of the first and second world wars and it only makes sense for this current onslaught of extreme violence to be studied to avoid history repeating itself.

I thought I would finish this book quickly given its short length, but the truth is, that despite following Plestia and her compatriots from the start of the current genocide and seeing everything on social media for the best part of 18 months now, reading her raw account of what happened was much more harrowing. I had to stop and take a break from what I read and my god do I recognise how much privilege I have to be able to do that, whilst thousands of innocent men, women and children still have no choice but to wake up everyday with no certainty that they won’t be put permanently to sleep by the cruelty of the IOF.

This was an incredibly well written account given the circumstances and really does put everything into perspective, even for someone who has known about and supported the Palestinian cause more broadly for a number of years now. Plestia is wise beyond her years and whilst that is meant as a compliment, it would be a huge injustice to not acknowledge that a lot of this is down to the fact that Palestinians are forced into that way of being from a young age, when they realise that their existence is politicised and, as Plestia correctly points out, their value unfairly correlates with how well they fit the “perfect victim” narrative that people in other crisis zones are simply not held to. The IOF has benefitted hugely from Palestinians and in particular Gazans not being seen simply as human beings just like you and I, who have lives and desires just like the next person.

This book is essential reading and I would recommend this to anyone who still has any doubts in their mind over whether this is a genocide or not. Thank you to Pan MacMillan and NetGalley for providing me with early access to read this incredibly important book.

The Eyes of Gaza is a diary of genocide from Palestinian journalist Plestia Alaqad.

Journalists on the ground play a vital role in capturing something of everyday life in times of trauma. Alaqad juxtaposes the relatable with the horrifying in what is a completely dehumanising invasion of Gaza. It is a dignified, impassioned portrait of a people under bombardment.

You can tell that social posts are her usual medium, and this book stays true to her voice. She writes with the candid simplicity of youth, her emotions raw and unedited, albeit filtered through some of the clichés all young writers rely on. Through the pages of her diary, recounting her first-hand experiences in her own words becomes a powerful reclamation of identity in a war that threatens her very existence.

This book is not only an emotional and compelling read, but it is genuinely the chance to Gaza from a Palestinian, who has lived there before and during the current genocide.

Plestia Alaqad shares her diaries that dont feel overly edited from her time reporting on her Gaza during Israeli attacks during the first few months of increased aggression following the events on 7th October. It reminds the reader that these events have been happening since 1948 and how she didnt know she would have to live through events that her family had told her about.

Due to the diary nature, we get snippets of her experience and the struggles she faced emotionally during her time in Gaza and since leaving. The entries are raw and confused, which leads me to believe they have attempted to edit only when absolutely necessary.

I thought her poetry added an extra layer to the book, giving us access to her deeper observations and feelings. I wish more people would open their ears to these stories, so we could try to bring an end to the genocide that Plestia witnesses in Gaza.